We are a flock of songbirds

I’ve been thinking lately about what it means to be together in this life… like, have each other’s backs… even-while-we’re-spread-all-over-the-world kind of together. 
I’m noticing that I’ve been conditioned to think that if I’m in a room alone that I’m alone in life. But the under-everything-truth… we do not do this life alone.

The concept of “together” is starting to take on some nuance for me. I am reminding myself that even though the people in my life are busy, they do love me, they are crossing their fingers for my success, and they do care what I’m going through. This challenges the idea that I’m truly floating unattached in the world. I am not. 

The other place I’m thinking about “together” is where actually being in contact truly IS this important part of being able to hold the sense of not being alone when I’m the only person in the room. That is, I need connections… real ones, physical ones, committed ones. As a social species, our nervous systems are organized around connection with others, we find an internal sense of safety through belonging, it’s just how we are wired. We’re wired to need each other.

“Together”, for people who have attachment wounds, is sometimes truly problematic. It’s fraught with lessons we received about not being allowed to have opinions, needs, being too much, etc. And so “together” can be a land mine. And sorting through the landscape of all of it might seem downright dangerous. Honestly, there’s no requirement that you do this kind of work. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. You are allowed to protect yourself in whatever way you feel is right for you.

And, if there’s something in you that feels like connecting, repairing a sense of belonging, and/or taking care of the one in you who feels desperate to be accepted or loved, might I suggest flying with a flock of songbirds? 

​Songbirds gather in groups in which they somehow manage to balance cohesion with crowding, following with leading, and safety with access to resources. They exhibit a grace of these qualities of togetherness + space.

What does that look like for humans? I think, often, we assume that it’s people we need, and while that might be true, for a lot of us with past trauma, people feel dangerous. I didn’t have what I needed to navigate safe connection with humans.

Instead, nature… the earth, trees, the ocean… they held me. I connected to nature first. I saw in nature so much of what I was trying to figure out. But it was opinion free. It was simply a reflection of one way nature has solved the problem.

So, if something is weighing on your heart, and you want some feedback, but people feel like tricky business… ask a tree, or a river, or the spider building a web attached to your trash can (seriously… some of my best advice has come from spiders).

​Be willing to sit and see what’s there. Join the songbirds and notice what you notice about how they communicate together, how they forage together, how they move together. 

Sometimes nature conveys her brilliance in a huge understanding, sometimes in a tiny thing we ponder for a long time, sometimes in such a subtle way that you never realize that you received it. 

Today I’m imagining my flock of songbirds… the ones who carry and hold and love me… often from afar… and those I carry and hold and send love to when they need strength and I have it to give. 

If it feels good to a part of you who needs soothing… know that I care… truly. I am way out on the edges of your flock of songbirds, singing up your name to energize whatever it is you’re asking for today.

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